Commitment
by BadaBingxBadaBoom
Summary: She was slowly beginning to understand her resemblance to sunflowers: they gravitated towards the sun sort of, in a way, like she did towards James Potter. LxJ. Marauder Era. Swearing and general teenage antics.


**(A.N.) This is set in the universe of **Jewels5**'s story **The Life and Times**. Incredible story. You really should read it. Credits to her. The idea came from the summary of another story, **Zayz**'s story** Changed**, so the leading and ending lines are credited to him/her.**

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"_We are so fragile_

_and our cracking bones make noise,_

_and we are just breakable, breakable, breakable girl and boys."_

~Ingrid Michaelson

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_LilyandJames. JamesandLily. Hogwarts' favourite couple._

This is how it began:

Lily Evans rolled over and sighed. Light streamed past her eyelids, dancing pink and gold and green and any other color her sleepy brain could pick out. She was comfortably warm, like if you were curled up in a soft woollen blanket in a rocking chair on the porch at twilight, she decided. Her sheets were tangled around her legs, and the pillow her cheek rested on was conventionally more _there_ than she'd remembered.

There was an incessant pounding in her head rapidly vying for her attention. The _there-ness _of her pillow would have to wait. This pounding felt suspiciously like the after effects of a Marlene-inspired, _brilliant_ idea that she really shouldn't have listened to. It reminded her of that time Hestia dumped her latest shag, disappeared, and convinced a case of firewhiskey to mysteriously appear in the dorms.

Of course, _someone_ had to drink it.

Well, the next morning wasn't pretty. Enough said.

_It's a hangover, _she thought. _Damn. Not good._

A groan found its way into her _there _pillow, which didn't smell the same as usual either. Strange.

See, Lily was teased quite often by her dorm mates (Marlene Price, Hestia Jones, and Donna Shacklebolt, if anyone cared. Also, let it be known that a certain Alice Griffiths shared their dorm, along with a Mary Macdonald, neither of which Lily nor her friends had much to do with at all, really.). Being her name was Lily, they thought it quite amusing that her portion of the seventh-year girls' dorms didn't smell like one.

In fact, if you asked several select boys (starting with an Adam McKinnon, a friend of hers, an Amos Diggory, a failed date of hers, a Miles Staler, an unfortunately drunken encounter of hers, and a James Potter, a stalker of hers, to name a few) what, exactly, Lily Evans smelled like, your answers would be close.

"Orchids, in spring." (McKinnon.)

"Vanilla." (Diggory.)

"Fresh air." (Staler.)

"Orchids and vanilla and clean air, I would say. Whatever it is, it's got something." (Potter.)

Generally, Lily's pillow tended to smell like Lily. This pillow, though, smelt nothing like orchids or vanilla or fresh air. It was green Quidditch pitches and well-aged scotch and, well, healthy teenage boy.

And then, her pillow moved.

That saying, '_curiosity killed the cat_,' really should have been '_curiosity forced the addled young witch to take drastic measures concerning matters that shouldn't need to be dealt with because they shouldn't ever have _happened _in the first place.'_

Turns out that Lily Evans's pillow was not, actually, a pillow. It was a shirtless teenage boy with long limbs and messy hair and a snore that could wake the dead. She realized this when she rolled over and propped herself up on her elbows.

Thus, screaming followed _very_ quickly after.

Lily toppled off the edge of her bed, sheets and all, auburn hair flying, to land with a thud on the hard wood floor. Her head protested loudly, as did her backside and all manner of places on her body. Her vision blurred and her brain struggled to keep up, so she just dropped all her muddled thoughts on their rears and drug the sheet over her head.

The bed creaked as the . . . _boy _in it shifted around, and leaned over to watch her, though she didn't see any of it.

"You know, you could always just close the blinds, Evans."

Lily blew out a gusty breath, exasperated already. "Fuck. Potter. See, you're not actually _here_. I haven't woken up yet, that's why this is happening to me." She tried, she really did, but neither Lily nor James was convinced.

He chuckled at her, actually. "So you admit you dream about me?"

Sheets were flung back over her head, revealing extremely dark and glaring green eyes, tangled red curls, and a deeply set scowl. Lily rolled onto her back and wished she knew where her wand was.

Scratch that, she wished she knew _what the bloody hell _happened _last night_.

Hazel and green. Green and hazel. Their eyes were strangely close today; James's leaning farther away from their typical gold-brown and closer to green. They still had nothing on the vibrancy of Lily's, but nonetheless.

James Potter _was_ good-looking, Lily Evans had to admit. Then, she caught hold of her train of thought and covered her face with her hands.

"Nononononono," she mumbled, squishing her eyes shut. Fabric brushed her nose.

"You're wearing my shirt," James pointed out, just as she held up her arm and asked, "Is this _yours_?"

"It's goddamn huge! What're you, part troll? Merlin."

"S'not my fault you're tiny." James yawned and retracted his head from the edge of the mattress.

Lily bounced up, tugged his shirt a little farther down her legs, and yanked the pillow out from under his head. "I have an extremely fast metabolism!"

"Ow! Hey, Evans, I was using that!" He reached out blindly to grab the offending thing back from her.

She scowled even harder at him, lifting the pillow out of his reach.

"Hey!" he protested, ruffling his hair with one hand, the other, having given up on the pillow, draped over the edge of the bed.

Lily slapped his offending hand. "Don't do that, you already look like you have sex hair – Holy shit!"

She threw the pillow viscously at his head. Fortunately, James's reflexes were shades better than she'd hoped, and she didn't get to witness it hitting him in the face. Not that she could have enjoyed it at the time. Her brain was occupied with other rather uncomfortable developments.

"Whoa, calm down! What'd I do?" he avoided her as she slumped to the mattress, protecting his face.

Lily levered herself into a defeated position, flat on her back, and stared at the dormitory roof. "No, no," she started, "it's 'What'd _we_ do?'"

He grinned, and she resisted the overly demanding urge to smack him. Hard. "I like we. We is good."

"Yes, well, _we _is going to get his ass kicked." She frowned.

There was, strangely, no response from the other person in her bed. Inwardly, Lily shuddered at that. _In her bed._ So wrong, on so many levels.

Then, "Kinky."

She repressed a screech and rolled off the edge of the bed, feet balanced, and dug some actual clothes out of her trunk. "I'm going for a shower. You _will_ be gone by the time I get out."

She retreated to the bathroom, surreptitiously glancing around the (completely _trashed_, by the way) dorm room in search of her missing wand.

"You don't want any help, Evans?" he yelled at her back (while also appreciating how good his shirt looked on her and, like any teenage boy would, the view).

"Fuck off, Potter." The door slammed. A couple pictures hung over the closest bed rattled ominously.

"Yes ma'am," he mumbled, still chuckling lightly.

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It took four days.

Many would have said that the absurd thought of _Lily Evans _going to _James Potter _for anything was worth betting money on. First and seventh years alike would have scoffed at the idea. Lily Evans hated James Potter, everyone knew that. They made it quite clear in the hallways, the Common Room, the classrooms, the Great Hall. . .

If you could fight in it, Lily Evans and James Potter have.

"Honestly Prongs, you're such a girl."

The four boys, aptly dubbed the Marauders by no-one-really-knows-who, were lounging in their dorm, Sirius Black and James Potter tossing a (stolen) quaffle between each other. Remus Lupin was trying to collect discarded items of clothing to send to the wash, constantly ducking the red leather ball as though it was nothing (which it was), with a bemused smile on his face. Peter Pettigrew was doing nothing of consequence, but for fairness's sake, he was studying Herbology on his four-poster, as he was failing said class miserably.

The quaffle smacked James's hands. "I am _not, _Padfoot. She was really upset."

The other dark-haired boy rolled his eyes. "It's Evans. She gets upset when your name is mentioned. What's so special this time?"

James rolled the ball in his fingers. "I don't know. It seemed forced, I guess. I don't know."

Remus cracked a window open, letting an unpleasantly chilly breeze in, and leaned against the sill, exchanging glances with Sirius.

"Maybe she's confused," he offered, constructively.

"Yeah, Moony's onto something," Sirius agreed. "Maybe it was the best round of—" Remus promptly and pointedly slammed the window shut, loudly, the glass rattling – "she'd ever had, and now she can't make herself hate you anymore, so she's just being a right bitch about it."

In the corner, Peter squawked uncomfortably at the word "bitch".

"Oh, don't get your knickers in a knot, Wormtail," Sirius waved a hand dismissively, before he ducked the quaffle James had launched at his head. It bounced off the wall quite well.

"Lily's _not _a bitch," he defended. Peter squawked. James paused. "Okay, so maybe she is a little."

"She's worse than Shack during _that_ time of a month," Sirius agreed cheerily.

Remus, James, and Peter heartily disagreed as one. "_No one's _worse than Shack."

"And besides," Remus added, "You and Donna Shacklebolt have been shagging for ages."

"Doesn't mean I don't think she's a bitter hag." Three out of four boys rolled their eyes.

A retort was saved from being thrown back as a knock on the door sounded just then. Remus answered hesitantly, as it _was_ after hours and likely to be Donna Shacklebolt or Marlene Price tired and beastly angry because the sound the quaffle was making as James and Sirius bounced it around was probably keeping them up. But actually, it wasn't Shack or Marlene; on the contrary, it was the one and only Lily Evans.

She looked like usual, pretty red ringlets tied in a low ponytail, typical Gryffindor uniform minus the tie and the shoes, and the top buttons of her crisply pressed white blouse undone, hands on her hips.

"Lily," he greeted, and she smiled distractedly at him.

"Remus." She peered around him, into the room. "Is James here still? Or is he already sneaking around wherever the hell he usually goes every night?" Lily was looking for James, and if that wasn't shocking enough, she'd actually _called_ him James. Not Potter, James.

The aforementioned Marauder jumped up, shoving Remus ("Ouch," he muttered when he connected with a pile of textbooks) out of the way, and leaned against the doorway. "Naw, I'm staying in for the night. What's up, Evans?"

She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear. "I need to talk to you."

"Obviously."

Eyes were rolled on both ends. "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Are you coming or not, Potter, because I'm not going to stand here and wait all fucking night." (It should be mentioned that Lily Evans, contrary to what one might believe, was no stranger to cursing. In fact, she did it quite often, with very little abandon.)

James chuckled and followed her down the hall and, eventually, the stairs to the Common Room.

Sirius watched the closed door with mild interest. "Told him she'd be back. I taught him well."

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"I hate you," Lily Evans said half-heartedly. She couldn't understand why she could say it with such conviction in her own mind, but have it come out so . . . feeble.

"Mhmm," he agreed airily. His long fingers twisted stray curl, and he was amused to find that Lily's hair was as soft as it looked. "Yes, yes you do."

"I do," she went on. Still not convincing. She was such a traitor. Wasn't there a 'No Marauders' clause in her friendship with Marlene and Hestia? Donna broke hers ages ago, so Lily felt no qualms about her. She's even worse, really. James Potter is one thing, but _Sirius Black_ is a completely new category. Species, even.

So why was she sitting out in the crisp October air, on the roof of what she figured out to be the Arithmancy classroom, with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, a butterbeer secured between her knees, and a James Potter next to her, as much of each other touching as possible on these highly uncomfortable shingles? And why did her skin tingle where his arm rested across her shoulders and where his breath tickled her neck? What had _happened_ to her? She was such a _traitor_.

She watched as James tugged a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, and lit one like a professional. She watched as he took a few drags, lips in the shape of an 'O', and repressed her hormone's appreciation.

James just stared as Lily plucked his cig out of his fingers and inhaled deeply, not once coughing, letting out delicate rings of smoke when she let go. "Nice," he whistled.

She rolled her head back on his shoulder so she could at least see his jaw, and stared, "What, a girl can't know how to smoke these days?"

"Sure they can," he grinned, looking down at her. "But most aren't nearly that good at it."

She scoffed. "Then you've clearly never met Shack and I."

James laughed, a head thrown back, chest rumbling laugh that echoed across the grounds, one that made Lily's toes curl and raised the hairs on her neck and arms. But not unpleasantly, in a strange way. It kind of made her stomach tighten and her lips twitch upwards involuntarily.

To distract herself, she knocked back the rest of her butterbeer, wedging the now-empty bottle in a crack between the roof's shingles next to her thigh.

"Why are you always such a mystery?" James mused, somewhat to himself but, at the same time, to the both of them, playing absently with her hair again. She found she rather liked it. She found she could get used to this, sitting in one of the most untouched (save for themselves, of course) places in the castle, away from the judging eyes that always followed her wherever she went, with just her and James, being themselves. Lily and James. James and Lily. Themselves.

_Traitor._ Quickly, she broke the spell and leaned forward, out from under his arm, tugging her hair away from his hands_. Self preservation_, she thought. _Don't get yourself caught down. You'll lose. That's how this works, you know. _"Because what fun would it be if I weren't?" she said instead.

He watched as she shook out her curls, running her small fingers through the knots he had made, not even flinching when she snagged a particularly nasty one. That was Lily, in a nutshell: tough, unbending and stubborn as hell.

James lived for that.

When Lily leaned back again (in other words, when she felt her pulse slow again and considered herself to have a firmer grasp on reality and make-believe), she stole his half-drank butterbeer from his hand and sipped at it. Against her own reasoning, she curled herself closer to him. _Body heat, _she thought. _It's damn cold out here, and I'm in a skirt. I'm _entitled_ to this, really._

But farther into the confines of her mind, something else was realized. She was slowly beginning to understand her resemblance to sunflowers: they gravitated towards the sun sort of, in a way, like _she_ did towards James Potter.

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This sort of thing went on for several weeks, deep into December. Now, let it be said that Christmas holidays were looming over the heads of every student attending Hogwarts, and that the impending freedom of the break had started chaos within the walls. Lessons were unproductive; people hardly payed attention. The Common Rooms in every house were always buzzing with excitement, plans being shared like wildfire. Needless to say, all of Hogwarts knew: who was staying in the glorious castle, who was going home, who was travelling where, and, while completely off-topic, who was shagging who.

Well, or so they thought.

The Ravenclaws' prided themselves on collecting only the latest pieces of gossip to distribute around the castle. It really should have been a characteristic of the house. Smart, strategic, undeniable gossips. Of course.

What they would say if they ever truly caught wind of Lily Evans and James Potter, after hours, or even Sirius Black and Donna Shacklebolt, was entirely unpredictable. But Lily Evans spent ages worrying over it. Her latest draft had begun to sound something like this:

"Ver, what kind of brain injury do you think she's got? Because last I heard, Lily Evans hated James Potter, and now, they're shacking up _all over_ the place. I _know_, right! Absolutely incredible. That boy is a demon. What can't he do? If he can melt Ice Queen Evans, then You-Know-Who better hold onto his knickers. . ."

_Shit._

Nervousness aside, Lily Evans was the same as usual. She suffered through lessons, writing notes and swearing at her own psychological complex that pushed her to be so attentive (more on that later), she let Hestia sneak down to the kitchens almost every night to get ice cream for the four of them to purge on at two in the morning (it has been attested to that this is the reason Lily Evans is always in such a bad mood – lack of proper sleep), and she swore at her Gryffindor tie every morning when she, yet again, failed to knot it correctly and Hestia laughed at her.

James Potter, on the other hand, was better than usual. He was cheery, he was cooperative (as James Potter ever is), and he was in love. This news hit him hard one night, but he was and he knew it. The first six years of Lily had been a past-time, then a challenge. But now, no, this, he concluded, was love. Euphoria was his new best friend. He was beginning to disgust his dorm mates, actually.

But back to Lily. She threw herself down next to Donna in the Great Hall, immediately reaching for the waffles conveniently located in front of Marlene, who had six on her plate already. Donna tsked, and Lily ignored her quite soundly. She chugged some orange juice, buttered herself a waffle to go, because just then was when she realized she left her unfinished Transfiguration essay in the library the night before and needed it to hand in today.

"Oh sit down, you prat," Donna insisted, Marlene affirming the sentiment with a mouthful of waffles and a nod.

Lily stopped and glanced at the two (Hestia was still, unfortunately for her, in bed), removing the waffle from her teeth. "Sure, I'll just leave it there. It's not like we have McGonagall first this morning or anything. Or like I'm failing Transfiguration already. Of course." This was delivered with as much sarcasm and venom as possible from a girl of Lily's stature (which was a lot). Smartly, there was no response. It was widely known around the girls' dorm that Lily was _not _a morning person, and had the strongest array of hexes at her disposal than anyone.

Before she could depart, though, the post arrived.

Generally, the post arriving is a nicely appreciated regular event to the inhabitants of Hogwarts. People grinned around mouthfuls of food as owls dropped letters and issues of _The Daily Prophet_ onto laps and tables, avoiding things like porridge and eggs in favour of toast and bagels. Lily Evans wasn't expecting any mail, so she very nearly missed her own owl swooping into the Hall among the other birds, a white envelope (Muggle style) tied to his leg. She would have missed it entirely, actually, if dear old Brunner hadn't dropped her letter in Frank Longbottom's porridge.

"Oi, Evans! This is yours," he called at her from down the table, holding up her soggy letter by two fingers. Congealing clumps of porridge oozed from the corners, which Lily promptly _scourgified_ off before she took it graciously.

"Sorry, Frank. Owl's not the brightest one in the cage."

"I see."

She hurried back to where Donna and Marlene were snickering at her, and plopped down beside Marlene, bumping her shoulder purposely, proceeding to read the still slightly moist paper."Well, hell."

"What is it?" Marlene asked. Donna didn't wait for Lily to answer, just pulled the paper out of her fingers and waved it above her head (damn her shortness).

"Hey, Hestia," Lily greeted the frazzled witch as she trudged into view. "Did you see my Christmas break forms in the dorms this morning?"

"Don't care," Hestia Jones grunted (she wasn't a morning person either). "Are those strawberries?"

"Yes, they are," said Marlene. "Why d'you need forms for, Lily, you're going home."

"Brilliant. I love strawberries," Hestia said.

"Mhmm. Sure. I've got to find those forms for McGonagall. See you in Transfig." And she trotted away up the rows of students, and out the doors of the Great Hall. No one watched her go. She was just another Gryffindor in a sea of red and gold, and she was safely off the Hogwarts whispering campaigns. For now, at least.

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James met her as she skidded down the halls towards Gryffindor tower. Well, met is a relatively calm adjective; they collided and scared the hell out of him. She looked like she had pixies in her pants and ten seconds to change them.

"Whoa," he steadied her by her arms, but she wriggled free.

"Can't talk, heading for the dorms. Oh shit, my essay's in the library! Fuck," Lily groaned, slumping back against the cobblestone wall, glancing either way down the corridor, clearly debating which was more important: essay or dorms. James just looked at her.

"I'll get your essay if you take a deep breath and try not to hyperventilate," he offered, and she brightened considerably, straightening and genuinely smiling at him.

"Would you? Oh, thanks, James, that's _brilliant_," she grinned and pecked him quickly on the cheek. He couldn't help but feel that this was progress, seeing as they weren't in some deserted part of the castle, they were quite visible from all directions, and Lily didn't seem horrified after doing it. But by the time he processed all this (which really wasn't all that long; James Potter was actually quite an intelligent bloke), Lily was gone. So, he set off for the library.

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"So, Ms. Evans. You'll be staying in the castle over the holidays, then?"

"Yes, Professor."

"Alright. You're dismissed. Oh, and Evans, that essay?"

"It's, ah, it's coming. I accidentally left it in my dorm this morning."

"Just hand it in, Evans."

"Yes, Professor."

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James was watching her again. He did that a lot. It used to unnerve her, grate unpleasantly on her nerves, but now she's used to it.

Her quill chose that very moment to break, and she tossed it off the edge of the roof in frustration, a hand fisted in her hair already (a habit of his that had unfortunately rubbed off), before rummaging around in her bag for another. Or maybe even her wand to set fire to the damn parchment.

"Oh, relax," he sighed. "Why do you try so hard anyway? You're obsessive." It was said casually, but the curiosity was blatantly there.

Lily blanched. This wasn't what they did. They met and shagged or snogged or whatever that night's fancy was, they sat together out on the roof afterwards, bathing in the postliminary bliss for a while, they shared butterbeer but stayed far away from firewhiskey (at her request), and sometimes they smoked cigarettes and watched the stars like the romantics they really were at heart. They didn't talk. They did everything _but _talk. Small, obligatory chit-chat and minor flirting was a given, but nothing deeper. _So what the fuck was he doing? _she wondered.

Delving. Unwisely, he was digging into her psyche, a place even _she _didn't want to be sometimes.

"Because I do," she answered vaguely, hands still in her bag, wishing he would somehow get distracted and leave it at that.

He didn't. "Wrong answer. Why?"

"Why do I stir my tea twice before drinking it, or always braid my hair to the left and not the right? I don't know; I just do!" she cried in exasperation.

"There's always a reason. Besides, everything's mapped out when it comes to you."

This made her pause and sigh. Her initial (and genius, she thought) plan to keep herself as aloof, untied, and unattached to him as possible was failing her. He was too damn observant, which really did shock her. James Potter didn't seem like the type to notice things as he bounded past with his levels of energy. "Because I'm crazy, alright? Right bonkers, you'd be best to stay away from me." She felt like laughing at her feeble, pathetic attempt to sever their ties.

He refused to be severed. "I always knew you were out there."

"Shut up, Potter. You really want to know why?"

"Yes."

"I'm a mudblood. No, I _am_, and it doesn't bother me. Much. At any rate, I shouldn't even be here. Getting top marks is my compensation, my way of proving that I actually do belong."

Silence greeted this statement. Lily could've sworn she heard the cogs working in his mind, the creak of the shingles as she shifted.

Then, a thought occurred to her: "Honestly. I have to justify my own fucking birth. I _am _crazy."

James was startled into laughing. "Only a little."

"Thanks James. You're so kind."

"What? I thought you were always supposed to agree with the woman."

"Not when she's insulting herself. Hell, Potter, you're a prat."

"I do try."

Lily rolled her eyes. "Obviously."

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They met later the next day, when James cornered her outside of the Charms classroom, fingers wrapping around her forearm and tugging her from the steady tide of sixth and seventh years. She looked up at him through her lashes and his damn breath caught, which he passed off as a cough. Then, he noticed the stunty little carrot-top first-year hovering at Lily's elbow, books stacked in his hands almost to his chin.

He arched an eyebrow. "Who's the midget?" The first year grunted in indignation, and Lily looked at him as though she'd just noticed he was there.

"Hm? Oh, that's Archie Willows. Don't mind him. Hey, kid, I've got Potions next. Take my books to Donna and tell her she'd damn well better save me a seat." She waved a hand to dismiss him.

"Donna Shacklebolt?" Archie Willows paled considerably.

"Yes, Shack. She won't _eat _you, you're too scrawny. Go." He scuttled off, but not without several glances back. Maybe he was hoping to see one of the _Potter and Evans_ infamous fights. Too bad those rarely happened anymore.

"And you said _I_ was cruel to first years," James admonished.

Lily hitched her bag up her shoulder, calm. "Marlene's paying him. Apparently, textbooks are possible projectiles in my hands, and I can't be trusted to carry them myself."

"Are you serious?"

"It's total rubbish. She's mental. But I don't have to lug around my own books, and it's her galleons, so whatever."

He chuckled. She really was off her rocker. "I need your History of Magic notes."

"Well, that's too bad. My midget has them."

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Spontaneity was one of his strongest traits. Lily learned this quickly.

"Have you finished that theory for Defence yet, Snaps?" James asked once, watching her struggle with the zipper to her skirt. He wasn't enough of a gentleman to offer to help her because, once she was done, she would be gone again.

"Yeah." She gave up eventually, and moved on to roll the sleeves of her blouse up. "Where are your exasperating – wait, what did you call me?"

There was that trademark, lopsided grin again (the one that made Lily smile back, whether she would admit it or not). "Snaps. You needed a nickname."

"Snaps." She tasted it on her tongue. "_Why_?"

"You're a ginger –"

"It's _auburn_," she defended, dropping tiredly onto the mattress next to him, to his surprise.

"— a ginger. Ginger Snaps. Snaps. S'not that hard."

"Ingenious, really," she said with heavy, heavy sarcasm, but laughed anyway, pushing ginger (_auburn_) hair out of her eyes.

"Obviously."

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It's the times when she's alone, left to her thoughts, that she discovers what was always hovering at the back of her mind, nipping at her conscience when she's busy. James. This time, she's sprawled out on her four-poster (sheets of parchment, Transfiguration books, and quills covering every inch of the bedspread around her) and procrastinating greatly. Her eyes have wandered to the top of the ceiling, her hands have left her homework alone and lonely, and she's thinking about anything and everything. But mostly just one thing (person).

"Lily's having dirty fantasies."

Across the room, Donna was paging through a novel, quietly, but she had to say something. The two girls had been sitting on each others' secrets for ages now, and it was about killing her that Lily hadn't even breathed a word about it to her since. Now, Donna never has been a great people person ("She hates everyone," Marlene would say here). But strangely, she and Lily got along.

Her head jerked up, and she blushed, which was something Lily Evans rarely did anymore. "I am not."

"About James Potter, is my guess."

"I am _not_."

"Denial. It's really a lovely shade for you, Lily dear."

"And bitterness seems to be yours," Lily retorted, stretching and knocking foot two out of three of her Charms essay off the edge of the bed.

"Here's my advice: Just _date_ the bloke. It won't kill you, you know," Donna sighs.

"Won't it?" she mumbles.

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"Mate, you're insane."

"I know."

"You can't handle this, Prongs."

"I know, Padfoot. I know."

~'.~'.~".~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.

This is how it ended:

He appeared at her door. This in itself was strange because it had always been _her _that finds _him_. But he was there, and he wasn't smiling, or looking anything like James Potter did, in her mind. He looked sad. And it scared her, to be honest, because James Potter has never, in all her years of knowing him, been so completely _defeated _looking.

Her bed must've looked pretty inviting, because he dropped onto it, resting his elbows on his knees and hanging his head. Moments passed, where she sat on the floor near her trunk, parchment and cloth fisted in her hand, hair fisted in his. When he looked back up, his eyes were dead, devoid, _empty_, and she reached up to finger the end of her plaited hair.

"I can't do it anymore," said James.

"Do what?" said Lily.

"This. Us. Whatever we are," said James. "It's all or nothing, Snaps."

Lily didn't speak.

"Okay. Jesus. Okay." He sounded strangled. And then, he got up shakily and left.

"Holy shit," Donna said from the corner, eyes wide over her book. Lily didn't speak. She couldn't speak.

Her heart hurt too much.

~'.~'.~".~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.

Nothing happened after this. Life went on. Only now, Lily Evans and James Potter _avoided_ each other completely, instead of the previous game they had going where they tried to touch as much as possible in a day without anyone noticing.

The rest of Hogwarts didn't care that a certain dark-haired boy was miserable, nursing a broken heart.

The rest of Hogwarts didn't care that a red-haired girl was crying in her dorms most nights and wasn't entirely sure why.

It all lead up to December 18th, 1976. Dooms Day, one might call it.

~'.~'.~".~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.

Breakfast was served with the same punctuality as usual, and post arrived perfectly on time. There were no indication that today, of all days, would be any more significant that yesterday or the day before. James Potter was sitting with his mates, and Lily Evans was sitting with hers. Regularity filled the castle.

But then, Lily Evans opened her post, and began to cry.

Tears sprung to her eyes, and she wiped them away because Lily Evans _doesn't _cry in the middle of the Great Hall. Then, she thought _What the hell_, and gave in. She had reason. Her hands began to shake uncontrollably. She couldn't even think properly to answer Marlene and Donna and Hestia's inquiries as to _What's wrong? _So, obviously, she was thinking quite crookedly when she stood from her spot on the Gryffindor bench and walked down the table.

The eyes of the whole Great Hall followed her as she ghosted past people, a teary mess of a girl, until all-too-familiar black hair was in sight. Sirius nudged him just in time to see her approach, lip trembling, eyes wide and unfocused, letter crumpled in her hand (she was still beautiful).

A decision was made right then. He could have ignored her. He could have turned back around, and ignored her completely. But he didn't.

"Hey," he said instead, choosing to be a masochist and torture himself because he could. "What's wrong, Snaps?" She just shook her head. "What happened?" She allowed him to take her wrist and guide her down to sit on the bench ("Oi! Shove over, Wilkes!"), and she leaned into him and cried, ruining his shirt, her reputation, and her make-up to boot.

"He died. He died he died he died."

"Who did?" He glanced up at Remus, on the other side of Lily, who shrugged and proceeded to wriggle the paper still clenched in her fingers away.

"My dad. What if you die too?" she mumbled.

_She wasn't really making a whole lot of sense_, he concluded. "I'm not going to die," he said.

"I'm such a bitch." Peter squawked. "A coward. Gryffindor, my ass," Lily muttered. James leaned close, to catch her quiet voice. "I didn't even say anything on the platform this year."

He didn't know what to say. Lily mumbled a little more, things he couldn't quite catch, but he did hear one of them.

"Why can't I say it to you?"

James looked at her, with her flushed cheeks and sad almond eyes and fingers twisting in her lap. "Say what?"

"You can't leave, okay? You can't die, and you can't leave. Please?"

"Um, okay. I won't."

"Thank god. I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. You were there, and I didn't say it. I wanted to, but I didn't. Fuck." He just watched her, shock carefully concealed because the rest of the Great Hall couldn't hear them. "I have this thing with commitment."

"What kind of thing?"

"I'm afraid of it."

"I think I can handle that."

"Well, as long as one of us can."

Then, silence. Comfortable silence, along with the general consensus (between Lily and James, as well as the rest of Hogwarts) that a miracle had just occurred, and Lily Evans had finally said yes to James Potter.

~'.~'.~".~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.

(Also, a Ms. Snaps would like it to be mentioned that a Mr. Prongs only passed his N.E.W.T's because of her gruelling hours spent helping him. And her lending him her notes. That is all.)

~'.~'.~".~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.

_LilyandJames. JamesandLily. Hogwarts' favourite couple._

~'.~'.~".~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.~'.


End file.
